Wish It Could Be Christmas Every Day
by laurelnola
Summary: The Doctor and Clara live happily-ever-after in a little town called Christmas. Sequel to "Dinner at the End of the Universe". 11/Clara, mentions of 12/Clara. Content now contains M material.
1. Chapter 1

11/Clara, Mentions of 12/Clara

M

Sequel to "Dinner at the End of the Universe"

* * *

 **A/N: This fic is dedicated to everyone who never stopped hoping for a happy ending between Clara and her Doctor- my Christmas gift to all of you who kept on believing in a truly epic love story.**

* * *

"You're going too fast!"

"You're going too slow!" the Doctor counters merrily, skating backwards along the frozen lake as he pulls Clara forward, holding her up. The village children are laughing and weaving around them, in the careless joy and haste of all children. Clara's eyes are glued to her wobbling feet, but he flashes her a grin, anyway. "A million lives and you never learned to skate?"

Her gaze snaps up as she scowls at him. "Somehow the act of saving you never required learning the double axel." She gives out a yelp as her feet slide far apart, nearly toppling her.

"Nice form, Clara!" giggles one the little girls sipping cocoa on the side of the lake, and Clara sticks her tongue out at the girl as they wobble by, nearly losing her balance again. She glances up and sighs, shrugging, and the Doctor laughs because he knows Clara understands everyone's impulse to smile and joke tonight. They've just defeated an invasion of the Slitheen, the third attack in the month since he and Clara arrived on Trenzalore, and the whole town is celebrating. This time, no one from the town was even injured, let alone killed. He hopes that, one by one, those species circling above like sharks in the water are getting the message, and remembering that there's a very dangerous captain in charge of this particular lifeboat.

Right now, however, he feels anything but dangerous. He nearly wants to leap in the air with joy at knowing that, not only is the town safe, he's kept Clara safe, as well. Not a hair on her beautiful head has been singed, and as he looks down at her, and she smiles helplessly up at him, her feet shaking back and forth, he wants to laugh out loud at his own good fortune.

The Doctor grins and then pulls her close, unable to keep himself from pressing against her for a moment longer. He swivels around and wraps one arm around her waist, holding her up and skating with ease.

Clara sighs with relief, and smiles up at him, and he thinks his hearts will burst out of his chest, because this is officially one new moment among thousands that he is infinitely grateful that this human woman is at his side. His index finger reaches up and touches the end of her pink nose, which matches the rosy cheeks that the cold wind has wrought on her skin. Her dark eyes look bottomless in the moonlight, he thinks, as inviting as the inky space of the universe that has been his mistress for so many centuries.

Space never had the warmth of Clara Oswald.

He squeezes her gloved hand in his, feeling her human heat, as she smiles at him. Her breath comes out in white puffs, and he represses an almost uncontrollable urge to kiss them in the air, because they are each a symbol that Clara is alive and warm, and next to him.

For a traveler who has been quick-sanded on a war-torn planet that is destined to be his grave-sight, he knows it is a bit obscene how happy he is, purely because he is with her.

"Couldn't we do a victory sled next time?" she asks, as he slides along the ice, still keeping her from falling.

"Righty-ho," he says, nodding. "Would you like to try the forest containing the Sontarans that will throw acid on us or the one with the Weeping Angels who will grab the sled from under the snow?"

Clara's mouth quirks, then her head nods perfunctorily. "Victory skate for the win."

The Doctor smiles."Clever clogs." He holds her tighter and presses a kiss to her temple. "Anyway, you don't need to worry," he whispers. "I've got you."

Clara lifts an eyebrow. "Who said I was worried?" she asks, and he loves that, too, how brave she always tries to be, even when he can see straight through her. "And for your information, I've got _you_ ," she tells him firmly.

The Doctor sighs and smiles, because what she meant was that she was there to protect him as much as he protected her. But he knows it's true in an entirely different way, as well. Clara Oswald has him by the hearts and soul, even if she doesn't know it yet.

It's something he should probably let her know at some point, he reasons. But right now, he's just too happy to be with her to care.

He skates onward with her, his experienced legs and her wobbly ones, knowing that the sight of them both is probably giving great entertainment to the villagers of Christmas.

* * *

Clara smiles, glancing over at the Doctor.

It's hasn't been that long since she'd come to Trenzalore for the last time, when she'd left her life with one Doctor and begun the rest of it with another, with the one who had first run off with her heart. But somehow, this life is the one that already feels normal, despite being nothing like her past, where she'd been divided between a big, blue planet and a small, blue box.

Her reality now is divided only between the two hearts that beat in the alien man she loves.

She watches him, standing at his desk, rifling through a box of spare parts. He tosses them, one after the other, over his shoulder, ignoring the clatter they make, until he finds the right one. And then his face lights up, like a child who's just gotten a favourite present, and his mouth curves into a smile that says how pleased he is with his own ingenuity.

"Ha! You see?" he says triumphantly, tossing his head to shake the hair from his eyes and looking back at her. "I knew we had it somewhere!"

Clara smiles back. It's the little things he does now, she notices, that tell her something has changed. Because the Doctor, for all his companions and long life, has been a solitary creature for as long as she's known him. And considering she has memories of him on Gallifrey, her knowledge stretches back quite a long way. But in all their time together, when the Doctor had ever spoken of his plans, they had always been _his_ plans, _his_ enemies to defeat, _his_ glory when he won. But the moment she'd arrived on Trenzalore, that had changed.

Now, he says "we", as effortlessly as breathing, as if she's become more than his companion, the woman who happens to be stuck on this snow-drifted planet with him. He speaks as though he doesn't exist as a single being anymore, but as part of a whole, part of her.

And every time he does it, something in her heals. That hard, warrior part of her that developed when she was with his older self melts just a bit, and she feels _her_ old self coming alive again, that girl he met who laughed and trusted so easily.

Every time he says "we", so naturally it sounds as if he doesn't even realize it, it's Clara who regenerates.

Clara still thinks of the older Doctor, with his blue eyes and silver hair, who had changed her from a girl who traveled with a madman in a box into a woman who could outwit, out-talk, and charge fearlessly against any alien in the universe. She can't ever speak of that future, and she knows that, too, was one of the skills he taught her.

He'd prepared her so well for her life on Trenzalore, where she now lives in front of a truth field and so must constantly, deftly weave around the truth like the TARDIS weaving through time and space. He'd said so often that he never wanted to change her, but, now that she thinks like him, she knows it was necessary.

Most of all, she wonders if he's alright without her, now that she also knows what she means to him.

She walks over to where he's already begun to use the sonic to solder bits of metal, causing steam to hiss. "Are you building another flying Santa sled for the children?" she asks, and he turns, still smiling.

"No, this isn't for them, it's for…" he stops and his face falls. "Oi! You're not supposed to be seeing this! Get out!" He makes shoo-ing motions with his knobbly hands, and Clara laughs.

"What do you mean 'get out'? I live here."

He frowns, still pushing her away. "Well, you can't right now, I'm working on something special."

She grins. "For me?"

The Doctor is still frowning, but says, "No, for us." Another bit of ice in her heart melts away, as he pushes at her. "So get out before I have Handles vaporize you on the spot for spying." He points to his cyberman head, which makes a feeble noise, trying to sound threatening.

Clara sighs, still smiling. "Ooh, right. Wouldn't want to have Handles stare at me to death." She picks up her basket and coat, heading for the door. She'd promised to meet Mrs. Harper for tea later, anyway. "Need anything?" she asks, hand on the door knob.

"Yes, for you to leave," he says, going back to his desk. His head shoots up just as she opens the door. "Clara!" he calls suddenly.

"Yes?"

His face changes then, his eyes worried. "Don't ever leave."

She smiles and drops the basket, running to him. His arms fly open and she's wrapped in them in seconds, his lips finding hers. She can't tell him that one day, far off in his future, she will have to leave, because it will be he who sends her back. She knows that if he knew that day was coming, he might not be able to bear the weight of it. But she can say the one thing that's so true she knows it in her bones.

"Clever boy," she says, affectionately tapping his nose, "You're stuck with me for the rest of my life."

"Souffle-girl," he tells her, relief in his voice, "I was hoping you'd say that."

It takes another hour for her to leave to meet Mrs. Harper. And when she does, she hastily covers her head with her scarf, hoping she won't have to take it off. She has a most spectacular case of bed-hair.

* * *

 _to be continued..._


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: Though most of this story is fluffy-bunny happily-ever-after (because good gravy, do we need it after the finale!), the humanist in me felt there needed to be at least some stuff that showed their relationship deepening. Realism in Doctor Who- the ultimate contradiction of terms- I know, but hey, I just write what these characters tell me. They're in charge. ;-)**

 **And guys, if you are enjoying the story, and want to read more, please take two seconds to let me know in a review. It really does help me keep writing.**

* * *

Not all of the time she spends in her bed is blissful. There are nights, usually after an attack, when the nightmares come.

They're not new, the nightmares. And now Clara thinks that they were probably inevitable, considering the vast amounts of memories, courtesy of her echoes, that were stored deep in her subconscious. Not long after she'd thrown herself in the Doctor's time-stream and miraculously survived, she'd asked the him why she only had glimpses of memories of those lives, why she had to concentrate to even remember some of them, and he'd smirked at her in a way that told her he was hiding something.

"Because you're impossible," he'd said, and she'd pursed her lips at him.

"That's not an answer," she'd insisted. "That much memory should have fried my brain, yeah? Why didn't it?"

He'd sighed, then, and wiped the a strand of hair from the side of her face. "I think it's because you're you," he'd said softly. "Because you still see only good in things, in people. And in me."

She'd smiled. "There's lots of good in you."

The Doctor had shaken his head with a soft chuckle. "I've never met anyone with so much hope," he'd told her. "Maybe that's what protected you."

"Hope?" she'd asked, surprised.

He'd turned back with serious eyes. "Never underestimate hope, Clara. Next to love, it just might be the most powerful force in the universe." And then he'd tapped her head. "Certainly strong enough to keep your lovely human brain intact."

She'd rolled her eyes at him, then, but now she thinks he was probably right all along. Because it had only been when she lost all hope that the memories, and the nightmares, had started. Her mind had never collapsed under the weight of all those lives until she'd collapsed under the weight of her own heart.

It was the day that Danny Pink had died instantly in the middle of the road. Until that moment, she had clung so hard to the idea that she, who traveled through space and time, who had lived a million lives, had saved a planet from annihilation and thrown rose petals at the wedding of Queen Elizabeth I, could still look forward to a quiet, normal life with normal things- job, husband, children, takeaway nights and after-holiday sales.

With Danny's death, in the blink of an eye, Clara Oswald, cheerful, earnest, hopeful, had finally turned into a creature that was more Time Lord than human. In that moment she'd realized with a chilling numbness that she was no longer a part of the normal world where death could be as simple as being hit by a car. Some horrible part of her had even called it "boring". In mere days, the kind, rational girl she'd been had descended so far that she'd been willing to destroy anything, including the TARDIS, herself and the Doctor, in the belly of a volcano, if it meant turning back time. It had taken a long while before she'd begun to accept that it had probably been more than Danny she'd been trying to recover- it had been her own innocence, to find that cheerful, normal girl she'd once been.

The dark truth was, losing Danny had been terrifying, but worse than that had been the realization that she'd somehow lost herself. And it had been the final act of polishing that had made her diamond-hard enough to at last withstand the weight of being a time-traveler.

So her past, and every life she had lived when she'd been split into confetti in the Doctor's timeline, had come steadily trickling out of her subconscious, and into her memory when she slept. The day of Danny's funeral, she'd had her first nightmare of her echoes' lives- of chasing after the Doctor as he drove by in Bessie, his yellow roadster, screaming for him to hear her. The next night she'd dreamed of helping the Doctor and his companion Peri escape from the guards in ancient Egypt, because Amenhotep II was preparing their execution.

One by one, they'd flooded back, along with every love, every loss, every terror and every joy. She'd had to face it alone for so long, never wanting to burden the older Doctor with what she'd been enduring.

And now she realizes, he'd known of her nightmares all along, because they'd been part of his memories. His past had been her present. But he'd been powerless to tell her he knew, or to even help her except to work harder than ever to keep her safe.

 _I have a duty of care,_ he'd said so often. Only now does she understand how _much_ he'd cared.

It's only now, in the solitude of Trenzalore, that she's able to bury her head against his chest and feel safe when she wakes up, so full of memories that she sometimes doesn't know who she is for the first few moments.

She wonders, too, if it's the same for the Doctor, if he sometimes wakes up and wonders why it isn't Sarah Jane's voice or Rose Tyler's perfume, or the groan of the TARDIS that are the first things to hit his senses when he wakes. She wonders how he manages to still allow himself to love anyone, let alone her, after losing so much.

Today, though, she should have known that the nightmare would be a bad one.

The Cybermen had managed to slip through Tasha's force field, changing their frequencies. What they hadn't expected was that the Doctor had purposefully weakened the force field, right over a patch of thin ice on the lake. The display of fireworks from the short-circuit they'd caused as they crashed through the water had particularly amused the children of the Christmas. But all Clara had been able to see were the Cybermen that once sat in cages of dark water, sucking out the souls of those lost beneath the ground.

Later that night, when she screams out in her sleep, dreaming of everyone she's ever loved, her Mum, her grandfather, Danny Pink, all writhing inside the body of a Cyberman, she wakes to find the Doctor hurriedly lighting the candle beside their bed, his face wracked with worry. He wraps her in his arms, his hand holding hers tightly near her heart, until her pulse slows down to normal once more.

After a few moments he whispers, "Was it the Dalek one again?"

Clara bites her lip, because there are days like today when the nightmares are especially bad, and he's found her crying in her sleep. She'd told him of all of them- of her appointment to the _Alaska_ , when her mother had given her a copy of her favourite opera as a gift, her eyes shining with pride, and how she'd screamed for her mother when the Daleks had imprisoned her, shoving wires into her body.

She'd told him of the young lamplighter from Victorian England, who came by the pub every Monday night to eat a dish she knew he hated, but ordered because she had cooked it, hoping to draw up the courage to talk to her.

She'd whispered of the morning she'd hid under the table, listening to her parents talk about taking her to the Time Vortex, and covering her ears so that it wouldn't be true.

Each time when the nightmares have come, he's woken her, held her close until she's fallen asleep again.

"No," she whispers, "not the Dalek one." But it only makes him hold tighter to her hand.

"It wasn't…?" he asks, and she shakes her head more forcefully.

"No," she murmurs, still facing the wall. "I didn't dream about them, either." She knows immediately who he means- the lives in which she had children, all now lost to time and space, just as his own children and grandchildren must be. It's the one thing of which they don't speak, and when she remembers the faces of those they've lost, human and Gallifreyan, she's not sure how either of them keeps breathing, how anyone does.

He squeezes her hand again, as if hearing her thoughts, the sorrow bubbling up in her heart once more. "Just hold on to me," he tells her. "Concentrate on where you are now."

But she's only human, and putting those memories away isn't as easy for her as it is for him. Her soul is now heavy with past lives, just like the Doctor's.

She feels the tears threaten at the memory, not just of her nightmare of the Cyberman, but the nightmare of all the loss of her echoes' lives. She holds tighter on to his hand. "I try," she whispers. "But I close my eyes and they're all around me."

It was what she'd meant when, long ago, she'd told the Doctor that it wasn't just he who had changed her, it was life. It was her million lives that had wrought the hardness into her soul, making her so very much like the man who lay inches away from her.

"Clara.." he says mournfully, but somehow it only makes her cling harder to him. The Doctor wraps his arms around her so tightly, she's no longer sure where she ends and he begins, as if he's trying to pull the pain out of her, endure it on her behalf.

"Doctor, how do you stand it?" she whispers against his warm skin. "How do you stand the memories of losing them?"

Her eyes raise to meet his and in the green depths she can see the staggering weight he carries in his soul.

"You remember the good things," he says softly. "It's all you can do."

He holds her as she finally cries, for the lost children of her echoes, lost parents and friends, all of whom she'd loved, and all of whom had been real to her, existing now only as memories.

Finally, when all her tears are gone, he wipes her eyes and gives her his handkerchief.

"Sorry," she mumbles, blowing her nose.

"Don't be," he assures her, gently holding the side of her head with one hand, cupping her cheek. "Not ever."

She wraps her arms around him again. "What a pair we are, eh?"

He smiles, a hint of sadness in his eyes. "Oh, no, Clara Oswald. You're not allowed to be like me. I won't have it."

Her mouth quirks, the smallest bit. "I think you might be too late."

The Doctor only holds her tighter, determined to make it not true.

* * *

He works harder than ever during the next week, though it becomes more and more difficult to make up excuses to get her out of the house. He's casually suggested to nearly every matron in the village that Clara would love to be invited for tea, and Clara has gone out so often that she's come back practically sloshing.

But finally, after months and months of secretive adjustments, tweaks here and there when she's not looking, he's finally ready to show her, and the Doctor has a hard time not grinning like a Cheshire cat when Clara comes back from Mrs. Harper's for the hundredth time, stepping through the door and brushing the snow from her hair.

He quickly rushes over to the rocking chair and sits, nonchalantly folding his legs, trying to look suave.

"You know, I never thought I'd get tired of cake," Clara says absently, unwrapping the scarf from her throat and tossing it on the coat-rack beside their door. The Doctor notices for the first time that Clara had placed it in the exact same spot that the coat-rack had been on the TARDIS, as though she'd been unconsciously replicating the entrance-way of his old home.

The thought of the TARDIS and where she might be, as it always does, flashes through his mind as his brain whirs the calculations as to _why_ his ship still hasn't returned in nearly a year. He's used the sonic for scanning the sky for a speck of blue almost as much as he's used it to create this gift he's made for Clara.

"Next time I get invited for tea, I'm sending you instead," she says emphatically, smiling and removing her coat. "You eat nothing but sugar, anyway," she adds, walking over and kissing his forehead.

He smiles. "Oh, I don't think either of us will be able to go," he says airily, idly bouncing one leg over the other.

"Oh?" Clara asks, sitting down on their bed and kicking off her boots. "Why's that?"

"Because it's Wednesday," he says, grinning more broadly.

"It is?" she comments, then shrugs. "I guess I've stopped keeping track of the days."

The Doctor frowns, because he's just said something impressive and she hasn't noticed. And she's supposed to be telling him how clever he is by now. Then he remembers that he hasn't yet shown her what he did, and that his brain just leapt about three paces faster than his mouth.

"Ah, right," he says, rising quickly from the chair and taking her hand. "I didn't explain fully. It's better if I show you in the basement."

Clara stops. "We have a basement?"

The Doctor turns, and realizes he's still too many steps ahead. His grin grows broader, as he pulls her over to the bookcase against the wall.

"We do now," he says, and pushes the bookcase away to reveal… a blue door. He clasps his hands, shuffling them eagerly, waiting for her to tell him what a genius he is.

He turns to see Clara gaping at it, a smile forming around her mouth. "You made us a basement with a TARDIS door on it?" she asks, nearly laughing, and he wants to hop up and down because she still hasn't gotten it.

"Not quite," he says, and opens the door, leading her down the basement stairs that he'd painstakingly hewn out of the rock with his sonic over the last few months. Clara follows him willingly, almost giggling, but her laughter dies the moment they reach the basement and she sees what he's done.

He looks over at her, sees the wonder on her face, and knows it was all worth it.

"You made another TARDIS," she gasps, and he wants to laugh at the sight of her, mouth open at seeing another blue phone box in the middle of the cavernous basement.

"Well, it's not a real TARDIS," he explains, rushing over and standing in front of the rectangular booth. "Capturing a dying star and freezing it in time is a little beyond the capabilities of a screwdriver, I'm afraid."

Clara moves closer, touching the side of it. "What is it, then?"

His grin returns, as he takes her hand. "I told you, something for both of us."

Her brows quirk in confusion and he laughs and leads her inside the box, showing her an exact replica of the TARDIS control room.

Now Clara laughs, too. "Oh, my… bigger on the inside!" she cries.

He scoffs. "Well, of course it is. What kind of TARDIS would it be if it didn't have that rather defining feature?"

But Clara's hands have clapped together like a child and suddenly he wants nothing more than to file away the expression of delight on her face, a treasure for his hearts.

"It's wonderful," she breathes, and he feels his chest expanding.

"It's not over," he counters. "I figured that since we might be stuck on Trenzalore for awhile, you might miss seeing new worlds and new species around the universe."

Her dark eyes find his. "Doctor," she says softly. "I have all the universe I need. Didn't you know?"

His hearts nearly swell enough to burst his chest. But instead he replies quietly, "I do, now." He kisses her hand, and grins like the boy she makes him feel. "But I still think you'll like this."

She laughs, and touches to controls of the TARDIS. "I already do. Getting to see the inside of the TARDIS again..."

"Oh, but it's more than that," he says, and presses a button, watching her eyes light up at the same time that the inside of the control room begins to whir and hum and groan.

"Do you know how long it took me to get that sound right?" he calls over the noise, smiling at her. "I thought I'd be another thousand years older before I got it!"

Clara laughs again, and he takes her by the hand, bringing her back to the door again. "Now, as I was saying, it's _Wednesday_. And on Wednesdays," he says eagerly, turning the handle, "Clara Oswald gets to see wonders."

He opens the door and shows her his masterpiece.

Clara's mouth drops in surprise, as they step out on what appears to be an alien world, where the sky above her is a pale orange, and the trees are covered in soft, purple flowers, and a herd of animals that look like one-horned zebras race through a distant valley.

"Where are we?" she breathes out, and the Doctor smiles even more broadly.

"We're still in the basement," he says, as she turns sharply, frowning in confusion, "Although what we're looking at is the planet Argolis."

She stares at him, open-mouthed, so he adds, "But this was before it became radioactive after the Argolins' 20-minute war with the Foamasi." He laughs and waves a hand. "And long before they built their Leisure Hive…"

"Doctor!" she stops him, her smile now full of amusement. "What is this?"

"It's what you'd call a hologram," he explains, gesturing around him. "A digital recreation of light and sound…" he pauses, and takes her hand, "…taken from my memories."

She tilts her head. "Your memories?" she asks, and he smiles because she's starting to understand.

"Yes. I used the sonic to create a replica of every place I've ever been, everything I've seen, all the places I still haven't shown you yet, all the worlds…" he says, holding fast to her hand, hoping she's pleased with his gift. His face turns towards hers, and he whispers, "Places I always hoped to take you."

But when her eyes rise to his, he sees tears in them. She bites her lip and so he gives her a hopeful smile. _For you, Clara_ , he thinks, _I'd give you my whole universe_.

"Surprise," he says softly.

Her hands fly to her mouth, and her face is shining. She's never looked more beautiful, standing in the midst of an alien world, and he knows it's because it's not just seeing a new wonder, it's because she's seeing the universe through his eyes.

"I don't know what to say…" she breathes. "It's so wonderful, I…."

The Doctor shuffles with embarrassment, because didn't she know she was worth all of this, and more? But then Clara throws herself in his arms and he forgets everything else but the feel of her body against his, her hands in his hair, her mouth on his, and his fingers gripping her waist.

When they pull up for air, he manages to ask. "Do you want to walk around a bit? The hologram moves with us so it'll even seem like we can go for miles before hitting the basement walls." An idea strikes him. "Or if you want," he says, hitting a panel on the side of the replica-TARDIS, making the scene around them suddenly change to one of inky black space, dotted with diamond stars, and he laughs as he and Clara suddenly begin to rise in the air, and she gasps with surprise. "We could float around Orion's Belt, if you'd rather."

She laughs, reaching for his hand as her feet move off in different directions. "Oh, my! You programmed anti-gravity, too?"

"I wanted it to be authentic," he says, his limbs floating, too, even while his eyes notice that her dress has begun to rise up around her hips. He grins again. He hadn't even thought of _that_ nice little bonus when he'd programmed the anti-grav. This might be the best Wednesday ever.

"Best Wednesday _ever_!" she cries, as he floats over and grips her wrist, pulling her towards them as though about to dance in mid-air.

"I take it you like it, then?"

Clara laughs again and hugs him so hard he wonders where she got the strength. "I've never loved anything more," she says, then pulls back. "Well, except for one thing," she adds, touching his nose with her finger.

He smiles, then, relieved and proud and so full of feeling for her that he needs more hearts to hold it all. "What would you like to see next?"

She grins at him. "Anything. Everything," she breathes happily. "Somethin' awesome."

He snaps his fingers, and kicks the panel with his foot so that they float back to the ground. They're both still laughing when he pulls her back inside their makeshift TARDIS, ready to pick a new wonder to show her.

It doesn't really matter where they go, he thinks. Out of the whole wide universe, Clara Oswald is the most wonderful thing of all.

* * *

 _to be continued..._


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N: I have never posted as fast as I seem to be doing with this story, but darn it, happy endings need to happen now to counteract finale feels. That's the plan, anyway. :-)**

* * *

"Doctor!" she cries, but it's no use. One of two Daleks that have managed to get through the force-field has already retreated into the woods, the Doctor in pursuit. The other, wounded and dying, is still randomly shooting laser-fire from the town square, where Clara and one of the children from the village are cornered.

Clara frowns, because she hadn't shouted from being afraid for her own life. The Doctor never leaves her unarmed in battle (despite the fact that he himself has a tendency to run after the very things that are trying to kill him, carrying just a screwdriver in his hand, she thinks with a sigh). She'd simply wanted him to wait for her, so she could get the girl to safety and then fight the battle with him.

The little girl, shielded behind her, lets out a whimper, then a shriek as the wounded Dalek continues to fire feebly, mercilessly, only steps from where they stand. It breaks her reverie and Clara looks up, feels her brows draw together in grim determination.

"Don't you worry," she whispers to the girl, her voice sure. "I know right where to aim." She holds up the cyberman's head, closes her eyes and feels the knowledge of her echo coursing through her. The junior entertainments manager had learned quite a lot about Dalek physiology.

"I know you don't have a choice," she whispers to her dying enemy, pointing Handles' head directly at a weak spot on the Dalek's body, "but neither do I."

She fires, and watches quietly as her enemy short-circuits and goes silent.

The girl whimpers again, so Clara gently puts Handles on the ground, then holds the little body in her arms. "Shhhh, see?" She says, nodding to the little girl. "It'll be a long while before they try to come back here again."

She says it, even though what she meant was that there would probably be many _nanoseconds_ adding up to to the weeks or, if they were lucky, months before the next attack. But the girl believes her utterly, because everyone knows that no one can lie in Christmas.

She watches the child nod back weakly, trying to smile, so Clara nudges her. "Told you there was nothing to worry abo…"

But she never finishes because at that moment, she sees the explosion, huge and fiery, coming from the woods where the Doctor has just run off.

And her heart nearly stops in her chest. Again.

* * *

She runs, without care, without knowing who exploded, if the Dalek was the victor and will kill her on sight. She doesn't care, she has to get to him, because she won't breathe again until she knows he's okay.

Clara runs, her brain automatically chanting that he couldn't possibly be truly hurt...

 _He has to be okay_ , she repeats to herself. _Still a thousand years to go, then a new regeneration cycle. All the things left to do, seeing Robin Hood and hatching the moon, and battling Missy and Davros on Skaro, finding Gallifrey again…._

Then she remembers that he also walked with a cane when she came to Trenzalore that second time, and maybe his leg is broken somewhere and he's in pain because he doesn't have enough regeneration energy left.

She screams out, "Doctor! Doctor!' because it doesn't matter if the Dalek hears her and ends her life, because, even on Trenzalore, she will fight to save him until her dying breath. She runs and screams some more until her voice and limbs begin to ache.

A tree seems to move in the distance and her heart leaps in her chest as she sees him step out from behind it. His jacket is smoking, but otherwise, he's unharmed.

"Doctor!' she screams again, only this time, it's from joy. She runs into his arms, and crashes her lips to his, peppering every inch of him with kisses, relief flooding her every nerve cell.

"What?" he mumbles while she kisses him recklessly. "Were you worried over a little Dalek?"

"Never," she orders between kisses, "do that again! You scared the life out of me!"

"It's just that I couldn't let him leave," he tries to explain while she attacks him. "He'd broken the code on Tasha's force-field and was about to transmit it to the rest of them."

"Just wait for me next time, you daft old man," she says sharply, her arms in a strangle-hold around his neck, her cheek brushing his as she holds him. The fact that he chuckles only infuriates her more.

"Clara, really, it was just one Dalek, I was fine," he says, and she can actually hear him smiling against her face.

She wants to kick him. And then love him to death. She'll be fine when they're home in bed and the only light in the sky is that of starlight. She needs to lose herself in his arms, remind herself that he's alright.

"Well, I'm not fine if something happens to you," she whispers, her eyes squeezed shut. Because the truth was, the Dalek hadn't been that frightening at all, until it had been aiming for the Doctor. Being struck in her body was one thing, being struck at her soul was another.

"Clara…" he whispers, his voice soft, conciliatory, even though she knows he thinks she's being irrational. They live on a planet always on the brink of war, there's danger in the sky at every minute. Of course she knows it. But it's never been, and will never be, her own life that she's guarding. Even now, like every one of her echoes, she will fight to save him from harm.

He has fought for her so often, has endured unimaginable agony for her. She can't let him down now. She thinks again of his older self, limping against his cane, and her heart constricts at the thought that it one day happens because she wasn't protecting him. He must sense the whirling thoughts in her head because he pulls back then, and smiles gently at her.

"Oi, listen," he says, his eyes still faintly amused, "I'm completely fine."

But Clara only swallows, and presses her forehead against his. "Home," she insists. "Right now."

He sighs and takes her hand, leading her towards the edge of the woods, and she swears that she shakes the whole way back.

She knows that the nightmares will be especially bad tonight. And though she also knows he'll be there, arms circled round her while she breathes in the warmth of his body, the sound of his hearts beating against hers, the battle of her echoes' lives is something she has got to face.

And soon.

* * *

Weeks later, as he stands in the middle of their sitting room, the Doctor is convinced that Clara herself is trying to shorten this last life of his- murder by humiliation.

"You have really _got_ to be joking."

"But the town wanted to do something special this year," she replies, her sweet voice doing nothing to assuage his dread.

"Well, why not a Punch & Judy show? Those are lovely," he tries, his voice muffled.

"Doctor," Clara sighs at him with exasperation. "It's a New Year's fancy dress party. And it's not like there's a costume shop 'round the corner. I had to improvise."

He checks his reflection in the mirror and is pained at the view of himself, covered in a bed sheet with circles painted on the lower half, an egg beater clutched in his hand.

His shoulders slouch, and he thinks that he no longer has to worry about how to stop the Daleks. They don't even possess a sense of humour, but he's fairly sure that if they ever see him in this outfit, they'll genuinely laugh themselves to death.

"I am not dressing as my mortal enemy. You can't make me," he says mutinously.

But Clara is beaming at him. "Yes, I can, and do you know why?"

"Why?" he grumbles, then stops as she puts on her own decorated bed sheet.

"Because I'm going as one, too," she says, standing beside him at the mirror, two pathetic-looking Daleks with egg-beaters for guns. He feels her small free hand reach out and find his. "And if you're a Dalek _with_ me," she whispers, "It's not as scary any more."

His own embarrassment halts at her last words, and in moments, his hearts constrict in his chest, because he realizes immediately. She wasn't trying to humiliate him.

She was taking on her nightmares, beating them back.

In the year they've been on Trenzalore, it's been the one enemy he hasn't been able to conquer, the memories inside her. So many nights he's found her crying in her sleep, usually after there had been an attack, and he's had to hold her, helpless, knowing he has nothing but the comfort of his arms and voice to help her.

But Clara was showing she was stronger than that. With her gargantuan courage, she was figuring out how to face the traumas of her echoes, now that they were spilling into her mind.

She was showing him how to help her.

The Doctor's eyes close beneath the bed sheet, and he squeezes her hand, almost involuntarily, his love and pride of her swelling through every molecule. He looks again at their reflection, and suddenly finds himself smiling at the sight. Because with Clara as a Dalek, the truth was, they were a lot less scary to him, too.

He marvels at the realization that, even without the ancient knowledge and understanding of his species, she still manages to teach him. He, the master of Time and Space, who has watched stars being born and the universe die, is still the student when it comes to the courage that one small human woman can display.

"Do you know…" he says softly, his words still muffled under the sheet. "I suddenly have this uncontrollable urge…"

"Yes?" Clara asks, her voice muffled, too.

"To exterminate your clothing," he finishes.

He's rewarded with the sight of her bed sheet shaking as she laughs underneath it, and his hearts swell some more.

 _We'll face this together, Clara_ , _and we'll win_ , he thinks. _It's what we do_.

He feels her squeezing his hand in return, and knows she understands.

It's then, right then. that he knows, looking at the pair of them in the reflection, the tall Doctor-Dalek, and the tiny Clara-Dalek in their ragged bed sheets- they _were_ a pair, just as she'd said, two parts of a whole he hadn't even known was missing from making him complete.

It had taken this small human woman, with her courage and her kindness, to remind his ancient Gallifreyan soul what he'd once been- to turn him back from a monster to being a Doctor once more. On his last life, he'd finally gotten it right, because she'd helped define who he finally was, who he'd be when his life, at long last, came to a close.

She had saved him, so utterly he knows there will never be words enough to tell her.

"Fine," he says, holding fast to her hand. "I guess you _can_ make me, after all."

He hears her sigh sweetly under the sheet. "Doctor, you never had a chance against the bossiest woman in Christmas."

And he nearly laughs, because it's true. He never had a chance against her.

She's taught him bravery in ways she can't imagine. And now, with everything he feels for her, he's realizes he wants to be brave once more. For centuries, he's run from this adventure, but now, this moment, he's never been more sure.

He doesn't just want Clara at his side, the companion he finally keeps. He wants to be part of her, wants her soul twined with his, in the most elemental way that exists for his species. He wants this more than anything he's ever wanted in his long life.

And he wants to laugh out loud at the irony that it's when she's dressed as the thing he most reviles in the universe that he realizes how much he has never loved Clara Oswald more. Instead, he brings her hand to his mouth, brushes his lips across it.

"Happy New Year, Clara," he says, his voice still muffled, as he smiles at the mirror.

"Happy New Year, Doctor," she says back, and even though he can't see it, he knows she's smiling just as broadly as he is.

It's going to be a very happy new year, he hopes.

And as soon as she's out of that Dalek-sheet, he has something very important he needs to ask her.

* * *

 _to be continued..._

 **A/N 2: Hmmm, whatever could he have to ask her? I wonder, wonder! ;-)  
**


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N: Funny thing happened while writing this story. I realized that while "Dinner" was largely just Eleven/Clara, their love story simply couldn't be limited to that anymore (darn you, Peter Capaldi, for being so awesome!). The legacy of her time with Twelve ended up being imbued throughout this tale, because I felt that being loved by the Doctor in *both* his unique incarnations is what's changed her to the person she is now. And I think that no matter what body he's in, she just sees the man she loves- all of him. Now, on to the happy!**

* * *

Clara stretches under the covers, her body relaxed and humming beside the Doctor's. She can see the sun coming up through the window, and realizes that they'll probably miss the daylight entirely, unless they hurry up to the roof. And watching the sun rise and fall quickly over their beloved lake is a ritual that they rarely miss.

But the Doctor isn't moving. He's laying on his back, staring up at the ceiling, one arm slung behind his head the other wrapped around her shoulder, his fingers tracing patterns on her skin. It's odd because he's usually never this motionless when he's contemplative. Normally, in fact, his body moves at the same whirling pace as his brain.

She lays her head on his shoulder, letting him think, wondering what's so enthralling in that brilliant mind that it would cause this unnatural stillness. His hearts are beating steadily, and she listens to the familiar _thump-thump-thump-thump_ that always makes her smile, simply because it means he's alive. It's a sound she's grown to love as much as the wheezing groan of the TARDIS, the one sound she knows she'll never hear again from the original.

"Clara?" The Doctor's voice breaks her out of her reverie.

"Yes?"

"Does it still bother you… that I might outlive you by a long while?"

She frowns in surprise, head still on his chest. "What?"

The Doctor is still whirling patterns on her shoulder, and he continues softly, "A long time ago, you said that the reason you were afraid to be with me was because my forever wasn't the same as yours."

She presses her head against his chest, remembering the anguish she'd felt, wanting him so greedily for herself, jealous of every woman who had ever been loved by him.

"I remember."

"Do you still feel that way?"

She doesn't hesitate. "No, not anymore."

"What changed?"

 _You did_ , she thinks. You regenerated because I begged the Time Lords to save you, because in that one moment I knew I didn't care if you lived forever, with a hundred more companions or lovers ahead of me, so long as you just lived. But she holds back the words with the skill she'd learned, and just tells him a small truth.

"I realized it was more important that you were alive," she says softly, "than that I got to keep you."

She hears his breathing become more even, and yet she also hears his hearts begin to speed up, thrumming against her cheek.

"Clara?"

"Hmmm?"

"Would you _like_ to… keep me?"

Her head lifts, and she looks into his eyes. They're green and hopeful, and his mouth is twisting in that dear, funny way that means he's nervous.

She smiles. "What do you mean?"

"Well, I was just wondering…" He pauses and sits up so that he's leaning on his elbow, facing her.

"Yes?"

"Would you… would you like to join with me?"

Clara can't help but laugh. "Erhm… we do that all the time already, don't we?" She says, leaning forward to kiss the side of his neck and smiling devilishly. She nearly laughs again as he blushes madly, then holds up his hands, shaking them.

"No, no," he says, sighing. "That might not have been quite the right word. In fact, there isn't a word for it in English, because it's a Gallifreyan concept, specifically."

"Well, say it in Gallifreyan, specifically. I might remember it."

He says the word, and she blinks.

"Sorry. Nothing." He sighs loudly and she tries again. "Just tell me what it means and maybe that'll jog something."

"Well, it means…mating."

"Again," she says, making a sweeping motion over their bed, " _all_ the time."

"It's not…argh, you're not listening," he says, getting up out of the bed, and actually pacing, making her suppress a giggle because he hasn't even noticed he's still in his pants, sagging comically on his hips. And yet never has his face looked more serious. "The word doesn't mean the…", he stops, rolling his eyes, "….the physical act."

"Shagging each other senseless, you mean," she interrupts, and his shoulders drop, his face scandalized.

"Clara!"

She grins unabashedly. "Alright, I'll be serious. It means mating but not exactly," she says, pursing her mouth and waiting patiently.

The Doctor eyes her suspiciously, as though waiting for another barb, then finally ploughs on. "Yes, well, as I said it means…" He pauses again, and flails around, apparently trying to come up with the right phrase.. "joining yourself to another person. It's something that can't be undone. Understand?"

Clara shakes her head, watching as he kneels at the side of the bed beside her, his voice dropping. "It means being joined to one another, and only each other… in here," he says, touching his bare chest, then hers. "Listen again." He says the word again, and suddenly, a memory blooms in the back of her mind.

She remembers now. Through the eyes of her Time Lady echo, she remembers that the people of Gallifrey had another ritual besides the brutal one of feeding their young to the Time Vortex- a beautiful, rare, and life-changing ritual that was just as defining.

Her eyes widen. "Doctor, are you…. are you asking me to _marry_ you?"

She sees his mouth quirk, and then grin broadly. "Well… yes. I am. Sort of."

She laughs. "Sort of?"

"Well, only because it's not just saying words and then undoing them later after you call a lawyer. Don't you remember? It's a joining that can't be undone by anything. Well, except death, really."

"Wow, no wonder you always had such commitment issues."

"I don't have them with you."

And she heals some more.

But his eyes are soft as his hands take hers, wrapping them in his own. "Clara, try to remember what this is. Time Lords are a telepathic species, that's what makes this something that changes us psychically, physically. It means joining part of yourself to another person so that you're only whole when you're with them."

She's smiling at him until the last word washes over her, because just then, another memory fills her. She remembers lying in bed with an older version of him while he speaks of the time he'd been most happy, and he'd told her, "I was more than happy, I was _whole_."

She nearly gasps at the implication, as everything becomes clear. When he'd spoken of his happiness that night, this was what he'd meant. He hadn't been talking about Gallifrey at all. He'd been talking about Trenzalore. And his life with _her._

Was this why? Was this why he'd so immediately told her that he wasn't her boyfriend after he'd regenerated? Because all along he'd been her _husband_? Was this why he'd been so delighted in thinking she was interested in her fellow teacher Adrian, who looked so like his last incarnation, believing that somehow, she sensed the bond between them? And most of all, was this why he'd spent so many years being both maniacally devoted to her, and yet always preparing to push her away until she thought she was going insane?

Her mouth drops open with amazement until suddenly, another paralyzing realization hits her.

 _All that time she'd been his *wife*_.

As she looks at his face, so beloved and dear, she sees not the green eyes and broad chin, the sweet mouth that she's kissed a thousand times. She sees the anguish that had been in his eyes when they had become ice-blue in his next incarnation, when she'd yelled at him that she loved someone else, when she'd told him to get in his bloody TARDIS and leave, when she'd betrayed him horribly and he hadn't even cared, and most of all, when he'd spent _four and half billion years in abject torture and agony simply to save her_ … it had all been about this- because he'd still been tethered to her, trapped in an anguish about which he'd never been able to tell her.

 _Oh, Doctor, what did I do to you?_

She sucks in a breath. He's offering her everything she's ever dreamed of, and yet _how_ can she knowingly put him through such hurt again, knowing what's to come? The thought fills her with torment of her own, that he'd not only loved her, but had been physically linked to her the whole time, helpless against the bond between them, watching her try to form a life with another man, and then, even when he'd had her to himself again, knowing he'd have to send her back. She raises a hand to her temple, feeling tears nearly spring to her eyes.

"Doctor…"

"Yes?" he asks, his face like an eager puppy, all hopeful eyes, and eager mouth and knobbly hands and a brain the size of a continent. And she loves him so much there are no words big enough to tell him. But if she does anything to hurt him, she's not sure she'll be able to live with herself. She's supposed to protect him, not doom him.

She feels herself chewing her own lip and sees him frown.

"What's the matter?" he asks softly, then smiles again, still confident as ever. "You already said you'd marry me ages ago."

She sighs, remembering how they'd laid in bed, much like this, in 18th century Bath, planning for a future with a cottage by a lake and the TARDIS in their back garden, so long before…

"I know, but that was before…" she stops sharply, reigning back the truth.

"Before what?" he asks, and Clara's eyes close, because he can't know what's to come.

"It's just…," she says, scrambling for enough of the truth to admit. "It's a big decision."

The Doctor laughs. "I know. Why do you think I've only done it once before?"

And now she frowns, her curiosity creeping past her worry, as she opens her eyes, realizing something just as important. "Wait, is this what you meant? When I mentioned all the times you'd been married, you said that only the one on Gallifrey counted?"

He nods slowly, his face becoming more serious. "Yes. Because this is what true mating is for a Time Lord." He clasps her hands in his, and his eyes look urgent, as though it's important she understand. "This is the real thing, Clara, the paradox of Gallifrey. We live for centuries and we change and grow and learn and almost nothing about us is permanent, except for this. This is where our promises mean something, where we never, ever lie."

"I know," she says slowly, because even if the memories of her echo from Gallifrey hadn't told her his words were true, she'd know they were because of everything he'd done for her when he became another man. "I remember now."

"Then you know what it means when I ask you."

She breathes slowly, as the memories rise in her brain, because he's right- what he's asking isn't just if she'll marry him. It's so much more. It's the literal offering of his body, mind, and soul, his willingness to mark himself as hers, as long as she's breathing. Just as she is his. As long as she's alive, she knows, he will remain part of her, his soul tethered to hers. And as much as it terrifies her of what it might do to him a thousand years from now, the fact that he wants this with her somehow heals every dark space in her heart that had ever wondered how temporary she was to him, someone to fill in the empty void until he moved on.

Because here he is, her Doctor- warm, alive, holding her hands and telling her that it doesn't matter that he might live centuries after her. As long as she is alive, he wants her, only. The magnitude of it nearly takes her breath away.

But she has to be sure, has to try one last time to go against everything she wants, for the sake of his hearts later on.

"Doctor," she whispers, hating every word, "why do you want to do this, when we might be stuck here for years, anyway." She swallows again, wanting him so much she aches in her bones. "It's not like I can leave you."

He looks down, surprise on his features. "Because it's not about whether you're right next to me or on the other side of the universe."

There's so much love in his eyes she thinks she'll cry in his arms at any moment. "What's it about then?"

He smiles gently. "It's about what you mean to me." He leans forward and brushes his lips against hers. "And taking the chance to show you while I still can."

And just like that, she understands. He couldn't show her how he felt in his next incarnation, because he'd known she was going to have to leave. And she'd done the very same, pushing him away in anticipation of him leaving to find Gallifrey. But now, here and now, he _can_ show her how he loves her, and finally, at long last, _she can show him, too_.

She can almost hear the older Doctor's voice in her head, whispering, absolving her of what he would endure on her behalf later on.

 _Take this, for both of us_ , he'd told her when he brought her back. _And don't be afraid_.

He'd known this was coming, what it would cost him, and had taken her back, anyway. He'd prepared her for everything, even this decision.

 _Oh, Doctor_ , she thinks. _Your love could fill twenty hearts, let alone two_

Her heart beats faster, overwhelmed with how much she feels for him, how much she wants this. He loves her. He wants her. It really is that simple, if she lets the rest of it go. She takes a deep breath, and lets it out, thinking that with it, all of her fears are escaping, too.

Gathering her courage, she closes her eyes for the briefest moment, and then opens them. "Doctor?"

"Yes?" he asks, his face full of hope, and she realizes it's because she's the one thing in this war-torn universe that makes him whole. His eyes, his old, ancient eyes in the too-young face, are so eager and beloved that he takes her breath away.

 _You make me whole, too_ , she thinks, then brings his hands to her own lips, kissing them softly.

And then she whispers,"Yes."

She sees his eyes widen. He stares at her, as his mouth slowly stretches into a smile so wide she thinks his face might crack. "Yes?"

"Yes!" she laughs, pulling him in and kissing him, her arms wrapped around his neck. "Oh, Doctor, it was always yes with you." She leans back once more and grins. "I would _love_ to be permanently changed by an ancient alien ceremony that means I'm psychically and physically stuck with you until I die." She laughs and kisses him again, and when she pulls back, his own grin is lopsided.

"Well, you know, we're all about the romance on Gallifrey."

"Hmm, that's what all their travel brochures say," Clara says, smiling, then bites her lip as she thinks of the cold, hated creatures on his home planet. She has never ceased in her daily litany to the Time Lords, whispering through the crack in the wall, telling them of the Doctor, of his bravery and his goodness. But _nothing_ challenges her ability to hide her feelings like that particular ritual, when she must plead to the people whom she will never forgive for what they once did to him, and to whom she will be forever grateful because they made it possible for him to keep on living in the first place.

He frowns indignantly, unaware of her thoughts, and she hears him protest, "Oi, I can do romance when I want!" His floppy hair falls into his face and instantly her malice at his people is forgotten. There's no room in her heart, just now, for anything but how much she loves him.

He has shown her wonders beyond imagining. But at this moment, she knows that even without ever seeing another alien world, another amazing corner of the universe, nothing will ever awe her as he does. This is the man, she knows, who will one day spend four and a half billion years fighting to save her, the woman he loves. She will spend every last minute of her life being worthy of him, she swears it.

"I know, Doctor" she says, her eyes dancing. " _it shows_." She pulls him on top of her, arching her back into him, hearing him gasp and groan as she pushes against him.

"I'll show _you_ ," he growls.

"Oh, do," she dares him. "Please, please do."

And as he quickly dives beneath the covers, assaulting her with kisses, Clara has to bite back tears of happiness. She is in the arms of the man she loves.

And she's going to marry him.

* * *

Hours later, Clara lays against him in the moonlight, and he listens to the sound of her breathing as she sleeps. The Doctor is naked beside her and her leg is draped over his, the sheets tangled around them.

He's smiling in the darkness, thinking of what he's just promised her, because it's the ultimate irony. Centuries ago, when he'd started to run, making this promise to anyone had been the only adventure he'd sworn to himself he would never follow again. During all his travels, he'd never once allowed himself to think that he would even _want_ this again- to belong to someone as he'd once belonged to a family on Gallifrey. Who, after all, would want to be joined in such a way to the Predator of Worlds, the Oncoming Storm, the man who had destroyed his own people?

Belonging to someone else was a notion he'd called one word, in fact: _Impossible_.

He chuckles softly. Because now, his Impossible Girl is in his arms, willing to be his for the rest of her days, just as he will be hers.

For the first time in a long time, he's even glad of the presence of the Time Lords on Trenzalore, that split-skin link to his home that will be part of his promise to her. The Doctor's mouth quirks as he thinks of the glowing crack in the wall, the Time Lords waiting behind it with ever-lessening patience. He's seen Clara sitting in front of it, rocking in her chair, nearly every day since they've been here. Of course, he'd asked her why the whispers of the Time Lords has been so fascinating to her.

"If you want to know anything about Gallifrey, all you have to do is ask," he'd said.

But she'd simply smiled at him, that inscrutable smile that said she was only half-telling the truth. "I don't need to know about Gallifrey."

"Then why all the interest in the Time Lords?" he'd pressed, her motives a complex puzzle that even his brain hadn't been able to work out.

Clara had shrugged, still smiling. "I'm only interested in one Time Lord," she'd told him, and this time, he'd seen nothing but truth in her eyes. "Promise." Then she'd kissed him and, as usual, his brain had gone strangely blank.

He sighs at the memory, and the power she already has over him. She's not just impossible. She's positively formidable. And yet his hearts are hers, gladly given. He couldn't take them back now, even if he tried.

As he holds her, he also wonders why she'd seemed to hesitate when he asked her to join with him. He knows without a doubt that she loves him. He knows that marriage and children are something she's always said she's wanted. And while it's not the Lake District and he's not a human, and there seems to be a possibility that the only children they might ever have are the ones that regularly stomp through the Tower for stories, marshmallows, and teaching lessons from Clara… he also knows that she's happy with him here.

The Doctor gazes down at her sleeping face and he searches for the answer, because he's learned every flicker of every muscle in her face, and there's no doubt within that the reason wasn't because she unsure of her feelings. He'd seen worry, not for herself, but for _him_ , in her eyes, and something tells him that it was about that gray area of the future of which she never speaks, except in the broadest terms possible. She knows something that's coming, and it's something she can't tell him.

So he strokes her hand with his fingers, and whispers. "Even without this, Clara, I was already yours."

She sighs in her sleep and the Doctor wraps his arms around more tightly. She's so tiny against him, with a spirit that's impossibly huge. He hopes with everything he is that he'll be worthy of her.

He breathes in the fragrance of her hair, and smiles when he feels her stir.

Clara's dark, lovely eyes flutter open and look up at him.

"Did you say something?" she murmurs.

The Doctor smiles. "I was wondering, do you think the town has a place where we can register for a toaster?"

Clara laughs, and he loves the sound of it. "And pick out our china pattern?"

He nods. "I do love a good china pattern," he says happily. "Maybe something with blue boxes on it."

She laughs again and it actually causes his body to respond with desire. It never fails to amaze him, really. He is over a thousand years old, a worn, gnarled old man inside the body of a lustful young boy who stirs to life every time she looks at him. And though Clara Oswald's soul was once so young compared to his, her million lives have aged her, too. Centuries of wisdom now exist in her, as well, flowing through the veins of her mortal body that he craves as much as light and air.

She is, as he always suspected, utterly perfect for him. And whatever is left of this last life of his, he will devote it to making her happy.

Clara rolls over, leaning her chin on his chest. "She'll be back on day," she promises, "The TARDIS won't let you down." Her face changes, almost imperceptibly, but of course, he sees it - that something about the future that she knows but can't say. It pecks at his brain as he tries to work it out, then sighs because right now, it just doesn't matter.

"Well, I can think of lots of ways to pass the time," he says, smiling, and her mouth quirks as she teases him.

"Ah, so that's what this is about," she says, her eyes dancing. "I knew this was just because we're stuck here, I'm available and you might as well make it official?"

His mouth falls open in feigned indignation. "Are you joking? Have you seen the way Mrs. Harper looks at me? I could marry her in a second if I wanted to, and she's much less bossy and a far better cook than you are, I might add."

Clara smiles at him. "You're impossible."

 _No, Clara, that's all you_.

"And you," he says, eyes dancing, "are very beautiful."

"Nah," she says, sighing and kissing him again. "I'm yours, Doctor. I'm just yours." And he realizes he was wrong. He loves her more now, this moment, than he ever has before.

As she rolls on top of him, bringing his body to life once more, the Doctor's hearts beat faster in his chest.

 _Whatever I've done to deserve this_ , he thinks, with a gratitude that would have brought him to his knees had he been standing, _thank you._

 _Thank you with everything that I am_.

* * *

to be continued.. _._


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N: On the third day of Christmas, your writer gives to thee- turtle doves for a Whoffle Wedding. Cut yourselves a slice of Christmas cake and enjoy. :-)  
**

* * *

What surprises her most is... no one is surprised.

The entire town of Christmas seems to have seen this coming, from the moment the two of them stood arguing on the steps of the Tower soon after they'd arrived. And everyone seems to know, without being told, that the Doctor and Clara are going to be celebrating soon.

The women of the town smile knowingly at her when she next comes to tea, and when Clara and the Doctor walk through the streets, her arm tucked in his, the children giggle and point.

Silently, gifts find their way to their front steps- a handmade quilt, a blue teapot, a bridal wreath. And, most treasured of all, homemade cards from the children of Christmas, wishing them well.

The day Clara wakes, opens her eyes, and realizes the date, she can hardly believe one body can hold so much happiness. The Doctor's side of the bed is empty, and she thinks she probably woke the moment he slipped out the door.

Even without this ceremony, she's already so joined to him that the absence of his body next to hers stirs her from slumber. But she's still smiling when she hears a knock on the door, and the voice of Mrs. Harper come drifting through the wood.

"Tea for the bride?" she calls, and Clara nearly hugs her own knees.

"Did the groom get to eat?" she calls back, her smile in her voice.

She hears her friend scoff on the other side of the door. "From the way he was skipping down the street shaking everyone's hand, I'd say he had about ten bowls of marshmallows. Are you sure you want to marry someone who can eat that much sugar? It's not normal."

Clara laughs and brings her hands to her face, amazed and elated all at once.

 _Today is her wedding day_.

As she glances out the window, she thinks idly that this day is nothing at all the way she'd ever imagined it would be. When she'd been a girl, today would have meant a walk to her parent's church down the lane, her father's arm wrapped around hers, a white veil, her mum and her Gran looking on proudly, a party they couldn't afford waiting for them, and some handsome mystery figure at the end of the aisle.

Instead, she's in a war-torn colony on an alien planet, her family on the other side of the universe, getting married to an alien with two hearts in front of her neighbors and his own species via a glowing crack in a wall.

She smiles to herself. It's nearly perfect.

The moment she thinks it, a breeze blows through the window, and through the bouquet of Christmas roses, which she'd chosen because they were her mother's favorite. The scent whirls around her, like her mother's arms.

Clara hugs herself again, because she'd already been wrong about today.

It was more amazing than she could have ever dreamed.

* * *

When your brain moves faster, time moves more slowly.

That's what he'd said to her long, long ago, in his own future. She knows now how true it is.

Because when she walks down the stairs from the roof, clad in her best dress, the only indication of her bridal status the small crown of Christmas rosebuds in her hair, Clara knows she will remember this, every detail, every speck of dust in the shaft of sunlight piercing the room, and every beat of her own heart.

She can see them all, everyone in the town, filling their sitting room and spilling out through the front door on to the steps of the Tower, all there to show them they are loved. But only one face among them draws her gaze. And when her eyes find the Doctor, she knows that her whole life, every echo, every important leaf in human history, had all been leading her to this, to him.

She walks towards him, standing in front of the glowing crack in the wall, as though he wants his own people to witness this act, and the sight of him nearly takes her breath away. He's wearing his long coat and favourite bow-tie, his strong jaw jutting proudly at the sight of her.

 _He's happy_ , she thinks. She can see it in every muscle of his body, the way he stands, rocking back and forth on his heels, his hands clasped behind his back, shoulders fidgeting, as though he's too excited to keep still. The sight fills her with joy, and Clara wants to laugh when she remembers how girlhood fantasies usually suggested that the mystery figure at the end of the aisle was the least important detail of a wedding day. Because looking at the Doctor, the man she loves with every part of herself, he is, in fact, the only thing that matters.

She finally reaches him, taking the hand he's holding out, and the moment her skin touches his, something seems to come over him. He quiets and stills, and for a fleeting instant she can see not only the man he is now, but the man he's destined to be, moving from a whirling hurricane to a solid tower, a harbor in the storm with the wisdom of the universe in his eyes. He is, at once, everything about him that she's ever loved.

Clara squeezes his hand as they stand facing one another in front of the rift in the wall, glowing as always, listening. But nothing can take away from this moment, not even the Time Lords. Silently, in the tradition of Earth, she takes the ring she'd fashioned using his sonic, and slips it on to his finger. It's the ring, she knows, that will remain on his hand, even into his next life. The thought that it had been she all along who had put it there fills her with a renewed sense of wonder, and when Clara looks up, the Doctor is smiling broadly at her.

She knows without asking that there are no words that need to be said. This wasn't an exchange of words, just as he'd told her, and her knowledge of what's to come flits through her memory. For a Time Lord, thought was everything.

And so, in the tradition of _his_ people, she thinks of how she loves him.

 _For the rest of our lives_ , _I will want nothing more than to be by your side._

The Doctor grins even wider, as if he'd heard her thoughts, and he looks down at the ring on his finger, squeezing her hand in reply. He takes her free hand in his, so that he's caressing the tops of her wrists with his thumbs.

As he does, she sees his body begin to glow as brightly as the rupture in the wall. The Doctor is staring into her eyes, his promise to her becoming a physical thing in the form of the life-energy of his species. She hardly has time to gasp as it suddenly flows out of him, surrounding them both, until they're standing in a golden cocoon of light.

The townspeople around them disappear from view, and for that moment, nothing exists but the two of them.

 _You are my whole universe, too_ , she thinks, unable to take her eyes from his.

And then, just as easily as he'd slipped into her heart, she sees him close his eyes, concentrating, and the energy that is his becomes part of her, rushing into her body and making her gasp with the ecstasy of it. Pleasure and love and warmth erupts throughout her human veins, filling her, expanding her until tears come to her eyes. Golden light flows from her fingertips, the ends of her hair and suddenly she feels as if she's being touched by infinity, the never-ending universe that he's traveled, and the infinite lengths to which he loves her.

"Oh," she gasps, and sees him as he opens his eyes, holding more tightly to her hands.

"It's me, Clara," the Doctor whispers. "And now I'm yours." He says it just as the last of the energy disappears into her, bringing her back down from heaven.

He pulls her into his arms, and she leans against his chest, as he reaches up, wiping the tears from her cheeks. The cocoon dissolves and dimly, she can see the townspeople at the edge of her vision once more.

But as her body quakes from fading ecstasy, she hears the Doctor whisper gently against her ear, "It didn't hurt you, did it?"

"No," she nearly weeps. "No, never, never." She holds him tighter, and can't tell if she's actually crying or laughing, and ends up doing both. "It was wonderful. It was you."

"Well, technically," he says against her skin, "now it's us."

Clara pulls back and this time, when she looks up into his face, something extraordinary happens She sees herself for the first time- not as the imperfect, too-short woman who never felt clever enough, compassionate enough. In his eyes, _she can see as he sees her_. To the Doctor, she is strong and kind, funny and brave, and full of human mystery. To him, she is exquisitely beautiful.

She gasps again, this time, not from what she feels for him, but what she now knows he feels for her.

She has never, in all her million lives, felt so loved.

Her face buries against his chest, because _this_ was the gift of Gallifrey, just as he'd said, this feeling of being complete in a way she never has before. This was the beauty of the Time Lords. She's hated them for so long, but the Doctor is part of them, just as she now is part of him, and what they've given her is so pure that it takes her breath away as she holds tightly to him.

He laughs softly, his hands wrapped around her waist. "Are you okay?"

"I'm more than okay," she laughs back, then meets his eyes, her face shining with the most amazing wonder he's ever shown her. "I'm….. I'm _whole_."

The Doctor smiles, so broadly she can nearly see the happiness radiating out of him again.

And when he leans down to kiss her, Clara hears, as if a world away, the applause and cheers of the townspeople of Christmas. She'd nearly forgotten they were there.

At that moment, she knows, with the Doctor's arms around her, she might have been convinced that no one but they two existed in all of space and time.

* * *

 _to be continued..._


	6. Chapter 6

**A/N: Okay, readers, a couple of housekeeping things:**

 **1) Not that it should surprise anyone, but this honeymoon chapter is (and thus the whole story is now) rated M. Fair warning and all that!**

 **2) I've had a fair few of you PM me to tell me that you have been leaving reviews that never end up appearing on the site. I WAS sort of wondering why the views were so high but no reviews were actually getting posted. I sent a word to admin but have so far not heard anything back about why this is happening. Someone recommended that I not post any more chapters until it gets resolved, but that's not my style, and I don't think it's fair to those of you who are reading.**

 **So what I'd suggest is that if you're enjoying the story, drop me a PM so I'll know you liked it. And otherwise, just enjoy! :-)**

* * *

"You know, when I said I wanted to go somewhere tropical, this wasn't precisely what I had in mind," Clara says, and the Doctor looks back at her, his face shining.

"What could _possibly_ be cooler than seeing dinosaurs on your honeymoon?" he nearly goggles at her, as they walk (she walks, he whirls) through the image of a herd of stegosaurs, Earth's Jurassic vista surrounding them as the holographic sun shines down.

Of course, she knows, they're still in their own basement, catapulted into a holographic version of one of the Doctor's many, many memories. And he'd told her he'd saved this program especially for after their wedding, so she knows how special it must be to him. Truthfully, it's special enough just to know that he's saved a lifetime of adventures just for her, because even when they're physically trapped in one spot, he is still the Doctor, and he'll always find the loop-hole to every obstacle. He'll always win. She sighs happily, just watching him, because the wonder on his face is so adorable that it's hard not to smile.

"I guess I was thinking of something more beach-side with room service," she confesses. "And less scary monsters."

"What?" he cries, aghast. "They're not scary," he insists, going right up to a stegosaurus that's idly chewing on a plant. "Look at that face," the Doctor says, then turns and nuzzles the dinosaur's nose, his voice dropping to baby-talk, "you're just a big beauty, aren't you? Yes, you are!"

Clara sighs, but smiles just the same. "Oh, alright. I guess I should have known that Time Lords don't really do honeymoons."

The Doctor turns, still grinning, and reaches for her hand. "What? 'Course we do. When you have a time machine, every day is a honeymoon."

She laughs. "That's what I mean. There's nothing really different or special about it for you. It's one more day at the office."

His eyes widen and suddenly she can see his brain whirring again as a slow, delicious smile spreads across his face. "Oh, you want to know what's _different_ about this, do you?"

He's grinning far too wide for comfort, she thinks, and when she speaks, her voice is actually hesitant. "Er. Yes?"

The Doctor taps the sonic and the hologram of the Jurassic view vanishes, leaving them back in the white-walled cavern of their basement. And then he quickly pulls her into his arms.

"Clara," he whispers. "There's something _very_ special about everything we do now."

"There is?"

"Oh, yes," he nods emphatically, "You know how I said we were now psychically and physically linked?"

He's _definitely_ smiling too much.

"Yes?"

"I meant that literally."

Clara frowns, because she's rather sure she would have noticed if she'd been suddenly joined to the doctor like a Siamese twin. "Um, what does that mean, exactly?"

"Well, I wasn't sure if it would work because you're…"

She smirks. "Only human?"

"I was going to say not from Gallifrey, but yes," he says, smirking back.

"And what would it mean if I was from Gallifrey, then?" she asks, trying not to get distracted by the fact that every time she's this close to his throat, all she wants to do is clamp her mouth on it. But the Doctor is too busy explaining to notice.

"Well, that's what I'm curious to find out," he tells her eagerly, "if it'll work the same on you, since some humans do have some degree of repressed psychic ability."

"Find what out?" she asks, planting a kiss on his chin to keep from sucking on his neck.

"If you can control my body with your thoughts."

Her head shoots up. "I'm sorry?"

And now the Doctor is smiling again. "I told you, that's why true mating for a Gallifreyan is such a serious thing. We share more than just a wedding ring," he says, and holds up his hand, waggling the finger that now holds the ring she'd given him.

"You can control each others' bodies?" she asks, mouth agape.

"Well, sort of," he explains. His other hand leaves her waist, idly dropping down the side of her hips. "You have to remember, Clara, that our society was dedicated to learning and expanding out knowledge, repressing any urges besides those."

"Hmmm," she says skeptically, as his hand finds her thigh. "Sounds like a good way to go extinct."

The Doctor smiles. "That's what I mean. Apparently, it was something we developed for survival reasons… so that we actually would get our heads out of books long enough to continue our species," he says, his body now so close she can feel the heat radiating from him. "There's quite a lot you might be able to do to me."

Her voice is breathless. "Like what?"

His mouth drops against her neck, now, and each word is punctuated with soft kisses along her skin. "Make me feel what you feel, control my blood-flow, heighten desire…"

Heat surges through her at the implication.

"Not sure I'll be able to do the same to you, though," he murmurs sadly.

Clara can barely get her voice to work. "Oh, trust me," she says, gulping as his mouth continued to suck its way along her throat. "You do all those things just fine already."

He pulls back, and she could curse herself for speaking. "I do?"

"Yes," she says urgently, pulling his head back to her neck, only to have him pop back up again, smiling.

"Really?"

Clara huffs at him. "Did you not just feel my pulse when you were doing… what you were doing?"

He smiles, then, a dopey boyish grin across his features. "Yes."

She smiles, too, unable to help it. "So you should already know what you do to me. It's _me_ that never knows how I affect _you_."

He pulls away, his face falling with confusion. "Never know how you affect me? You've got to be joking."

She rolls her eyes. "Oh come on, Doctor. We both know you're never out of control with me," she stops, then says with an air of resignation, "the way I am with you." She sighs, because really, this was not a conversation she'd ever wanted to have. She'd accepted the fact that she couldn't really expect much more from a man whose entire species was so centered around control that they had mastered time itself.

He stares at her, incredulous. "But… but I'm _never_ in control when it comes to you," he says emphatically. "Not since the day I met you."

Clara pulls back slightly, and her arms cross, because it was impossible for him not to have noticed this. "Yeah? Then why are there times when I touch you that you don't seem to react?"

His mouth is still hanging open. "When does that _ever_ happen?"

She sighs, flushing. "Well, last week, when we were setting the table, and I got between you and the table and… brushed against you….?"

"Yes?" he asks, utterly confused.

"Nothing happened."

The Doctor's mouth falls open. "We were outside in front of the _whole town_! It was a village picnic!"

"Yes, but you didn't even react," she says with pique. "You just kept putting your new-and-improved sparklers on the children's plates."

His brows draw together with disbelief. "I'll have you know I most certainly _did_ have a physical reaction," he insists, then frowns at her, scolding. "And then I reversed it immediately because did I mention we were in front of the _whole town_?"

Clara giggles at his indignation at the idea that he would have walked around, perfectly tented and on display for the villagers of Christmas while they had their picnic. "Oh, alright," she concedes. "I know you have perfect control of your own blood flow. I just sometimes wish you didn't, I guess."

He lets out an exasperated sigh. "Clara, that's what I've been trying to tell you. I _don't_ have perfect control anymore," he says, smiling suddenly. " _You_ do."

Her brows furrow, studying him. "What do you mean, 'I do"?"

He's smiling again. "I told you. Psychically and physically linked."

"Which means what?"

The smile becomes devilish once more, and pulls her close again. "I'm not entirely sure, since I've never been joined like this to a human," he says, turning her around so that her back is pressed against him, his arms circling her. "But if we wanted to experiment, say…."

"Yes?" she asks, her own heart speeding up because she has no control of her own blood flow, damn him.

The Doctor's head dips down, lips brushing her ear. "Think of what you want me to do to you."

Her eyes fly open, but she instantly can't _help_ thinking of what she wants him to do, taking her in every way imaginable, standing, laying, sitting, his body sheathed in hers, hard, pounding and….

She hears him moan in her ear, and his arms circle tighter as he staggers slightly and she feels his instant erection, pressing into the small of her back.

"Whoa," she breathes.

"Crikey, Clara," he nearly chokes out. "I think you've got the psychic part down just fine."

She smiles, nearly breathless herself, and pushes herself further back into him, hearing him groan with helpless need, the feel of his physical desire for her making her heart beat in double-time. He more than wants her, she realizes. And he'd allowed himself to be put completely at her mercy, to make him not the Doctor who was always in charge of every situation, but a man nearly blinded with need and lust for the woman in front of him.

No wonder it had taken him a thousand years to try this again, she thinks, amazed at the power he'd given her, and suddenly humbled by it, all at once.

"Need you," he whispers hoarsely. "Now." He turns her back towards him, his lips crashing to hers, fingers groping wildly for the buttons on her dress.

"Doctor," she almost protests, but he cuts her off.

"No talking," he orders. "I'm…" He stops, pushing her up against the basement wall, then dropping to slip her knickers off from underneath the dress. "…in the…." he says, rising up again to fumble with the zipper on his trousers. "…middle of…" he continues, lifting her up into the air, wrapping her legs around his waist with a grunt.

"Of what?" she asks, only half-caring.

" _Being out of control_ ," he nearly roars, slipping into her with one hard thrust, and making her gasp and moan all at once as he rocks her against the wall, holding her up with his hands.

She cries out against him, feeling every thrust upwards, hears his clothes sliding against hers, his breath hot in her ears as he groans and pants, desperate lust in his every sound and movement. And this time, more than any other… she more than senses it. She knows it, what he feels, how he yearns for her every moment of every day, his desire to not just love her tenderly, but to mark himself on her like a man possessed, to hammer his body into hers, fill her up until she screams with ecstasy. She'd been making him scream inside for years, she just hadn't known it.

He's still holding her with his alien strength, gasping and clutching at her as he pounds against her and already she feels the familiar tightness curling in her womb, ready to explode. Oh god, he's going to make her shatter against this wall, where he hadn't even bothered to remove their clothes, so desperate had he been to get inside of her. Pleasure builds higher and higher in her muscles, and she thinks suddenly that he might feel it, too, if she lets him. So she tilts her head back and lets him in a second time, into her mind, to feel her pleasure, how he's bringing her to edge.

He yells out as it rushes over him, and when he pulls back to look at her, Clara feels the wave break, bliss exploding through her as she comes, her legs going slack around his hips, and suddenly he's screaming with her as she leans forward, moaning into his mouth as they shake in one another's arms.

When their trembling ceases, she slides down to the ground, drawing in breath as he slips out of her, holding on to him for support. She can hear him struggling to catch his breath, just as she is, and she leans her head against his chest.

"Doctor," she finally whispers, when she's able to speak. "Is it always going to be like that?"

He laughs, still panting, and she hears the rumble of his chest against her cheek. "It's going to shorten my life considerably, if it is."

She laughs, too, holding tightly on to him. "I could always direct more blood to your hearts, if you need me to."

The Doctor chuckles, suddenly lifting her into his arms, scooping her under her knees with one arm, the other around her back. "My Clara," he says, his voice still rough. "You _are_ my hearts."

She loves him so much at that moment she could cry. Instead, she lets him lay her down on the hay-strewn floor, where he quickly removes her clothes and his, then slips in beside her, pulling her head to his chest.

"You're mine, too," she promises him, listening to the slowing sound of his hearts beating.

And he is, she knows, as she snuggles into him, holding him close. He's more than her heart. He's her whole universe.

* * *

 _to be continued..._


	7. Chapter 7

**A/N: My dear readers, thank you so much for the messages (since the site is still being glitchy with posting reviews- sometimes they get through, sometimes they don't) letting me know that you've been loving this story as much as I've loved writing it. I feel like I've finally brought them full circle, the way that "Dinner" and "Laws of Attraction" were meant to be completed.**

 **This final chapter is a long one, but it felt like it needed to be posted in its entirety in order to feel whole. I couldn't seem to break it up. Like the Doctor and Clara, all the parts belonged together.**

 **Mostly, thank you all for riding yet another Whoffle wave with me, and letting me know along the way how much you enjoyed it (and if this darn glitch ever gets fixed, I really would love if you would let me know in a review)! No matter what ever happens on the show from this point on, I hope you know that getting to write for these characters, and for you, has been a joy. Thanks for all the smiles, and may you all have a very Happy New Year!**

* * *

" _Please_ , Doctor," the girl says, while he stands outside, scanning the sky with the sonic.

"I want to see them again, too!" says the boy beside her, her twin brother. "Flying snow-men are _cool_ ," he cajoles, scratching his knee.

The children are both sitting on a plank of wood that makes up the little fence around his front garden, their legs swinging back and forth. They've grown, both of them, the Doctor notices, since he and Clara have been here. When they'd arrived, he realizes, both of these children had been in prams, still babbling and cooing. Has it really been ten years already?

"Look, can't you two see I'm busy? There's a war on up there, in case either of you cared to notice," he replies sharply, but the children merely shrug.

"Clara says you just like to _look_ busy," the boy informs him.

"So that people won't notice that your brain is actually up to something else," the girl finishes.

"Oi!" He snaps up, his mouth open and his index finger pointed in the air to deny it all.

The children giggle at him, and he feels his mouth working as his enormous brain that actually _is_ always up to something fails to come to his rescue.

"Doctor?"

The voice that belongs to the person who has rescued his soul fills his ears, and he forgets everything else. Daleks, Sontarrans, Slitheen, Cybermen, Weeping Angels, the Papal Mainframe, the town of Christmas, and every Time Lord behind that crack in the wall…. they all melt away.

He turns and sees the reason for his complete happiness, standing in the doorway of his house that could be blown away at any second, and his hearts beat faster, no longer under his control.

Clara holds out a china cup and smiles at him. "Did you know saving the universe _does_ come with a tea break?"

The Doctor smiles back. "Does it, really?"

Her mouth tilts into a smirk, and he loves the way it looks on her face. "Mmm. I checked the employee manual."

"Ha," he says, then pockets the sonic, pats the children on the heads (he'll think about where the last ten years slipped away later), and hurries towards her. "That's because you," he says, taking the tea and kissing her cheek, "are a clever, clever clogs."

"Yes," she sighs, smiling and making him feel ten feet tall. "No wonder you keep me around."

"No wonder," he agrees, following her into the house, because he'd follow her anywhere, to the ends of time, through the Cloisters of Gallifrey, through his own worst nightmare, he'd follow her, and never stop to think twice about it.

* * *

The first thing he sees when he walks through the door is Clara's rocking chair, overturned on its side, the light of Gallifrey spilling through the spindles as it lays on the floor. A quick glance around the room and ice fills his veins, as he sees drops of blood on the table, a knife beside it, and an upturned bowl of flour.

Images of Clara being attacked in their make-shift kitchen, by any number of enemies above, zoom through his mind and the nanoseconds before the Doctor sucks in a breath to scream her name feel like eons.

" _Clara!_ " He can barely hear his own voice.

"Yeah, what is it?" Clara's head pops around from the other side of the blue door of their basement.

The Doctor breathes again. And then notices the speck of blood on her cheek. Along with a few…. fish scales?

"What..." he manages to croak, "….what are you doing?"

She frowns at him. "Trying to make your Christmas present," she tells him, "which I thought might be easier in the TARDIS II's kitchen."

He gapes at her as she holds up the skeleton of a fish that's only been partially gutted. "Do you know how ruddy hard it is to make fish fingers from scratch?" Clara says, huffing at him. "And don't even get me started on the custard. Couldn't you build a Tesco in the basement, too?"

She might be saying something more, but he doesn't hear it, because he's already scooped her up in his arms, his hearts beating again, relief flooding through him.

Only two decades with Clara Oswald, and his whole eternity can be contained in the frame of her small, human body.

"My stars," she says against his ear, laughing softly. "If I'd known fish fingers would make you go all grabby, I'd have started making them years ago."

The Doctor pulls back, his forehead falling against hers. "When am I _not_ grabby with you?"

She smiles, and he lives again. "Fair point, that."

He breathes in the smell of Clara's warm flesh and the sound of her beating heart and tamps down the bottomless rage and revenge that had threatened to erupt when he'd thought someone had dared to take her from him. He squeezes her harder.

 _Mine_ , he thinks, unable to help it.

But Clara's hands are already on the buckle of his belt, and her mind is sending waves of desire to his brain that make his knees weak in an entirely different way. For the millionth time since he'd joined with her, he is smugly pleased at how brilliant he'd been in deciding to make this beautiful, tender, feisty, annoyingly danger-prone soul a part of himself.

Clara's soft mouth curves as her fingers nimbly undo the button of his too-tight trousers, the fish fingers project utterly forgotten, and the Doctor amends.

He's a bloody genius.

* * *

"Do you know what I find fascinating?" he asks softly, his green eyes watching her.

"No, Doctor," Clara says, and her voice is thin, whispery. "What do you find fascinating?"

He takes her hand and she feels her bones ache at the touch. She glances at where their fingers are intertwined and sees the frail hands, more than lined, with ripples of veins and skin that hang like loose paper over her tiny bones. The Doctor lifts her hand and kisses it, as though it's fresh and plump and soft. He beams at her.

"That after sixty years on this planet, you still haven't learned to bake a proper souffle."

Clara smiles, her face hurting a little from the movement. She's lying in bed, and the Doctor is sitting beside her, holding a stack of Anniversary cards from the children of Christmas.

"Also," he adds, as if it were an afterthought, "that you are rather beautiful."

"You say that every year," she tells him in her thin voice, and he brings a hand to her cheek, stroking it.

"That's because it's true," he says simply.

Clara looks down at her own limbs once again. "I don't suppose Tasha was able to source that hand cream from the Aphrodites?"

The Doctor looks at her, puzzled. "What would you need that for?"

She sighs. "No reason, I guess." She manages not to roll her eyes at the way he constantly ignores her aging. She used to think he truly couldn't see it at all, but once he let something slip that told her he did indeed see, he just didn't care.

Many years ago, she'd been combing her hair at her dresser and frowning, because more gray hairs were sprouting all over her head. And it wasn't until she'd averted her gaze from her own reflection that she'd realized the Doctor had been sitting on their bed, watching and positively beaming.

She'd turned around, confused. "Alright, why do you look like the cat that ate the canary?"

His grin had only gotten wider. "I was just thinking how nice it is that you're finally becoming more my type."

Clara had let out a feigned offended gasp and thrown her hairbrush at him, laughing. "I'll have you know that I'm perfect for you already."

He'd shaken his head skeptically. "I don't know. If Mrs. Harper hadn't already been taken…"

She'd leaped off her chair, tackling him on the bed, and he'd smiled and pushed the hair away from her face as she lay on top of him. "You are perfect for me, Clara. I just meant that you're becoming more how I really am on the inside."

"Ah, you're saying I'm becoming a daft old man?" she'd teased, and he'd rolled his eyes at her.

"Impossible girl."

"Impossible old lady to you," she'd smirked, and he'd scoffed in return, kissing her nose.

"Bodies are boring, how many times have I told you?"

"Ah," she'd replied silkily, "but there are so many interesting things they can _do_." Her mouth had reached down to nip the side of his throat, and when she'd pulled back, his eyes had been slightly unfocused.

"Do you know, I'm suddenly thinking of quite a long list of things they can do."

And she'd laughed again as he'd flipped her over with a growl.

Now he sits beside her, decades later after she'd still been able to jump on top of him, when strength was still a normal part of her body. And Clara knows that, apart from anything physical, he's been secretly glad of every year she's aged simply because each one has been the proof that he's kept beating fate.

To the Doctor, every year she's stayed alive has been his own victory against the universe.

His face brightens. "So, for our anniversary, you told me you wanted to see inside the Library of Alexandria, so that's what I programmed in the sonic for you." He kisses her hand again. "And speaking of insides," he says, leaning down and dragging his lips, still young and full, across her frail jaw, "I so want to be inside you, Clara. Do you think you feel well enough today?"

She feels herself sighing happily, remembering the nights and days of pleasure they've had for six decades. It's the ultimate irony to her that her aging body has seemed to fill him with more passion than even her younger self ever had, and he's become more lustful the older she's gotten. She knows that part of it is growing love, but there's also the indisputable fact that the older she's become, the less time they'll have together. The clock has been ticking, Clara knows, and it's as though the Doctor has wanted to spend every possible moment physically loving her while he still could.

Eagerly, she lifts her head from the pillow, but then falls back, suddenly exhausted. She's not twenty-eight anymore. She is very, very sick, in fact. And while her mind has been free of nightmares for decades, her body can only fight for so long.

His face falls for only a moment, and then he smiles. "You know, on second thought, I'd rather have a lie-in," he says, sitting down on the bed beside her. "Now, you can nag me all you want, but I have to rest sometime, after all," he tells her, and she wants to laugh at his thinly-veiled subterfuge, even though the one she thinks he's most trying to convince is himself.

His arms, strong as they ever were, gently bring her tired body against his chest, and he rocks her gently. Clara inhales the scent of him, that wonderful combination of male skin and sugar that is so uniquely him. She thinks of how that scent will change one day, when he'll become another man, one she'll love just as much, and he'll smell of the leather of his arm-chair and the sharp tang of whiskey. She wishes so much, this moment, that she could tell him of what's to come. How she'll love him, even when she tries not to, and how nothing in the universe will be able to keep them apart, not even those whispering voices from Gallifrey.

Her eyes close and she can still feel the golden light from the crack in the wall, radiating on her face. She no longer hates the Time Lords, though there was a time she thought her hatred would burn till the end of her days. But she understands them too well now, perhaps. She can never forgive them for what they will one day do to her Doctor, but she will also never be able to thank them enough for saving his life when no one but they could have done it.

And part of her thinks that after sixty years of telling them of what the Doctor has meant to the universe, and to her, they understand her, too. She's done all she can to ensure his future, so that when the time comes, the Time Lords will impart their gift of life to him, keep him going, keep him running.

 _Run for me when I'm gone, Doctor_ , she thinks as he holds her. _Oh, run for me, you clever boy._

As if he can hear her thinking of his home-world, Clara hears the Doctor idly humming some long-forgotten Gallifreyan lullaby. To her ears, it sounds like the music of Heaven.

At the sound of his voice, she can almost feel her body come alive with strength, as though all the blood of youth is surging back through her veins, the lines falling away, her hair growing dark and thick, as though she is once again becoming the young woman that he will always see. She brings her hand to his smooth cheek, watching the smile play across his mouth.

And Clara Oswald, frail, imperfect, human, nearly feels another heart growing inside her chest, and they both belong to him. This life he has given her, this wondrous, magical life was nothing like what she thought it would be, and yet has been everything she ever wanted.

In their little house with a view of the lake, with the children of Christmas crawling in and out of their home, all of whom were so dear to the both of them, with death and birth and renewal in the town, with frightening battles from the sky and mundane fights in their sitting room over why he had to leave his clothes strewn all over the place and after 1200 years didn't he bloody well know what a wardrobe was for, and the way he'd give her a crooked smile so that she didn't even care. He'd given her everything she'd wanted in that ordinary life, in the most extraordinary way possible.

"We could also go see the waterfalls on Parkon," he whispers, still holding on to her as though determined not to see how tired she is. The Doctor gives her a winning smile. "It's Wednesday tomorrow. Any adventure you want."

But Clara merely smiles at him. "Doctor, didn't you know," she tells him truthfully, " _you_ have always been my greatest adventure."

His head bows, then, and he says nothing, but merely drops to press his cheek against her temple, his hand resting near her heart as though the sound of her heart beating is the most beautiful music in the universe. She wishes, not for her own sake, but for his, that it would go on beating forever.

She knows what losing her will do to him, she's watched it happen already. He will be so very lost, for so long. But he won't be alone forever. The people of Christmas will be help him, one generation after another. He is, after all, so easy to love. She smiles quietly to herself because she knows that a person who loves him more than anyone will also one day appear. A younger Clara, the girl she'd once been so many ages ago, will come back to him one day, and will help him move on from this life of his to the next one.

And what adventures they'll have together.

They'll be in love, then, too, she knows, even if neither of them will ever be able to admit it. And oh, how he will make her yearn for him every bit as much as he yearns for her. It's all still coming for him, she knows, and she wishes so much that she could tell him that death is not the end.

 _Not everything ends. Not love. Not always._

And with Clara and her Doctor- not ever.

He has so much more life to experience, so many more adventures, and with other companions, too. But she also knows that they will always be part of one another, as they were meant to be. To know that he will be safe, and loved, and hopefully happy- it's all she can want. Because this Time Lord, this god and idiot and alien with two hearts…he has made her so much more than safe, and loved, and happy. He has given her a life of infinite, beautiful wonder.

And Clara Oswald, who knows she is dying, far away from the planet of her birth, is so very, very thankful for every single moment of it.

She is more than thankful, she thinks, as the man she loves holds her tenderly in his arms.

She is blessed.

* * *

His young body can't move, because the weight is too much.

He's alone in the graveyard, because he just screamed at the villagers of Christmas to leave, to leave him the hell alone, and when they'd stayed and one of them had tried to split the ground with the spade, to begin to dig so the Doctor wouldn't have to do it, he'd yelled in fury and had split the young man's lip with his fist.

The Doctor, the Predator, Oncoming Storm sits, broken and alone on Trenzalore, and for one wild moment, he wishes the armies in the sky would just finish off his worthless life, because death would be better than this.

 _Clara_ , he wants to wail. Instead, he looks down at the hard ground, knowing he must bury her beside the spot that will one day hold his own grave, because that's what the Whispermen had predicted long ago, that fixed spot from which even he could never run.

 _The girl who dies, he tries to save_

 _She'll die again beside his grave_

How often had he cheated Time and Space, Fate and the Universe to keep Clara alive, the real, heart-beating original who had spawned a million echoes that died for him. Until today, when she'd finally slipped from his grasp, from the simple act of her body giving out from age.

He stares at the spot where she will lie, where his own TARDIS is also destined to die, with him inside it. Their graves, intertwined, he thinks, like the vines that will one day cover his ship as the life finally leaves it.

What will be left to live for then? What's left, now?

His hearts thunder in his chest, a steady four-beat that quickens as a thought, sweet and sure, forms in his head: he could end the pain, right now. He could end it all so easily. Just let them in, the Cyberman, Daleks, all of them- just let them kill him. He's out of regenerations, so he can't even be tempted to try to prolong his miserable existence. And he no longer wants to, anyway. With Clara, beside her, that's where he belongs. He'll dig a hole for himself, too, then crawl inside and wait for one of them to come finish him.

He actually does it, he begins to dig the grave, not for her, but for himself. His hands tremble and his own tears make it hard for him to see what he's doing, but he digs on. But it will be alright, he thinks. Someone will find his body beside hers and then they can lie together for eternity, as they were meant to do.

It will be a release from hell, at last. And he'll see her face again….

His breath stops, and he pauses with the spade because he remembers, from very long ago, when Clara had promised him that he _would_ see her again. She'd never told him the whole story, but he'd gleaned enough to know that some past version of her, or even one of her echoes, had met up with him in his future, when he'd been much, much older. She'd never said how much older exactly, but, in her own way, she'd made sure he understood that her death wouldn't be the last time he saw her.

He looks at the spade for the quickest of moments, and swallows.

Another Clara is coming.

An echo? He thinks wildly but then dismisses it. Everything in his soul told him that she'd meant herself, her true self. Which meant… a past self, the Clara that had existed during that period when she had aged years in between leaving Trenzalore and returning only minutes later.

 _His_ Clara. Coming back…..

He clings to the two words like a lifeline, a buoy in the storm of his grief-stricken mind. _Coming back, coming back._

But for how long? Would he have more years with her? Or would it only be days, or worse, mere minutes? Was he supposed to give up an eternity with her in this grave just for a few measly moments of seeing her face again in some far-off future that could be centuries from now? What kind of solace could that possibly bring when his hearts were now dead in his chest?

Another tear slides down his jaw and he grips the spade tighter, as an image of Clara's face, so perfect and real, forms in his mind that he actually gasps with need.

 _Clara_.

Oh, yes, it would be worth it. To see her again, warm and alive….

The Doctor turns back to the Tower, where he has loved Clara Oswald for more than 60 years. His body has hardly changed since the day they arrived, and yet his mind has aged more in the last few days than it has in all those years.

His arms can still flail with ease, his legs can still skip, but they have lost their reason for doing so.

He squeezes the spade in his hand, glances over at Clara's body laying peacefully on a raised bed inside the horse-drawn cart. The young women of the village, who had been like grand-daughters and grand-nieces to them both, had dressed her this morning, tenderly wrapping her in her favorite red velvet gown, and crowning her silver head with a holly wreath. They had wept as they'd dressed her, and hugged the Doctor, who had simply sat beside Clara's body like a broken toy.

Even Tasha had sent down word that the Papal Mainframe would mark the day with offerings and prayers for the soul of Clara Oswald, that the earth woman would be remembered as the life companion of the Doctor for as long as Tasha Lem governed the church.

His eyes roam over the small, human body that contained the most beautiful soul in the universe, and he thinks, as he does every single time he looks at her: _Mine_.

His Clara, his wife, his love, his friend, his reason for living. She's leaving, and yet she's coming back. She'd promised him. He breathes deeper, willing himself to believe it, because she had told him it was true.

Clara is still coming for him, alive and real and out there, a world away, finding her way from her path to his.

All he has to do is wait.

"Doctor," comes a soft voice behind him.

He turns soberly and sees it's the man with the split lip, dried blood on his chin. He's surrounded by his neighbors, all the young villagers of Christmas. Only this time, they've brought something with them- Clara's rocking chair.

It's the one in which she sat, every day of their lives here, facing the glowing crack in the wall and never telling him why it held such fascination for her. The young man puts his hand on the back of Clara's chair and takes a deep breath, and the Doctor understands.

Slowly, he walks over to Clara's chair, lets his weight fall into it, and somehow he feels her spirit all around him.

 _Rest now, my warrior._

He sees the young man silently take up the spade and walk over to where the Doctor had begun to dig, as the rest of the villagers sit on the ground, surrounding their beloved Doctor, giving him strength as the work to create Clara's final resting place is resumed.

He knows they all think it's not fitting that her husband should have to be the one do it.

But they don't know she's coming back, of course she is, she's his impossible girl. It's the thought which sustains him, keeps him from losing his mind entirely. Clara is coming back to him.

He sits silently as other young men help dig the grave, and the young women sniffle and wipe their eyes at the Doctor's feet, holding his hands. He watches mutely, a strange sort of numbness creeping over him. Tonight, he will go back to the Tower, and sit in Clara's rocking chair, putting it back in front of the crack in the wall. She'd thought it belonged there, and so now, he does, too.

He'll tape up some of the cards the children have left for him, and he'll let his new life begin. And he'll wait for Clara to come back to him.

* * *

He can still feel her kiss on his aging cheek, can feel the words he'd promised her hanging in the air.

He'd meant every word. He will never send her away again.

He knows she'll go back eventually, but it must be something else that causes it, because the Doctor is not about to lose Clara Oswald again, not after living for centuries with only her memory.

It had been all that had kept him going, that promise she'd made to him long ago that he would see her again. And now, here she was. The thought that he might have years ahead with her makes him nearly want to skip around the TARDIS control room, despite the pain in his leg.

He has to be right. Clara had aged more than just a few days in between those minutes when he'd sent her back the first time, and when she'd shown up on the doorstep of the Tower. And though they still couldn't leave the planet while the siege continued, that simply meant she must have gotten to stay with him for years here on Trenzalore before she'd gone back in his timeline. He nods to himself.

Yes, he'll get to keep her for a long while, maybe even years, with many more sunsets on the roof, many more nights of holding her in his arms, making her laugh, making her happy.

His hearts lift with hope, and his brain can only think one thing:

 _You're back, you're back, my Clara, I love you, you're back, and I'll never send you away again_ …

He catches sight of the view-screen, seeing young Barnable sitting outside the TARDIS, and suddenly the Doctor remembers something else- something that makes his stomach drop.

When she'd come to Trenzalore to _stay_ , Clara hadn't known her way around Christmas.

In fact, she'd spent the first few weeks getting lost at every turn. She'd recognized nothing and no one, as though… he swallows, closing his eyes as the truth grips at him.

Wherever she'd been in that missing chunk of time, it _hadn't_ been on Trenzalore. _It hadn't been with him._

The sickening realization washes over him. She isn't meant to stay with him. She isn't his to keep. The girl below is not his Clara, but a ghost come to torment him.

And that means, he thinks with cold dread, that she can't stay, not for another second. She has to go back if she's ever to finish her timeline, so that she can eventually find her way to his past, where he'll love her, make her his wife, watch her grow old, watch her die…

He pushes the view-screen away roughly, wanting to scream.

 _No!_

It isn't fair, he's owed. He's _owed_ this! Just another day with her, another minute, anything. But he already knows that it's hopeless.

If he keeps her now, he'll be re-writing the one part of his timeline that he doesn't dare change- getting to join with her and love her for the rest of her life. He'll erase the best and happiest years of his own life, and maybe hers, too.

His hand slips inside the pocket of his vest and he takes out the ring that Clara had put on his finger nearly three centuries ago. He'd been planning to put it back on, with her at his side once more. Instead he clutches it in his hand and his eyes squeeze shut, knowing that this is what he must protect, that life with her.

The TARDIS whirs softly at him, and the Doctor lets out a shaky breath. Quickly, he tucks the ring into a compartment on the control panel, because wearing it now will only torment him further. His wife is gone, he tells himself. She's gone and buried beside the spot where he, too, will one day lie.

But as he hears her voice down below, calling out that the turkey is done, his fists curl in desperation _._ His wife or not, it doesn't matter. He only knows he loves her, and he now must do something that will make her hate him for it.

He must trick her and send her away. _Again_.

"Smells great," he calls back, and hopes she can't hear the agony in his voice. Because it's at that moment he programs the TARDIS, his eyes closed, his hearts in such pain he's not sure he can keep standing.

And just like last time, he won't be able to say good-bye. He can hear her closing the door to the Time Winds and the sound jolts him into action, because the moment he sees her again, he'll never have the strength to go through with what he knows he must do.

 _Forgive me_ , he thinks, and hurries out the door before she can come up, knowing that one look of her dark eyes, alive and beautiful, and he'd be lost forever. He doesn't even look down at Barnable, or back at the TARDIS. Limping on his cane, he moves as quickly as he can and goes straight to his house, collapsing in Clara's rocking chair in front of the glowing crack.

Only the Time Lords will witness him screaming with helpless rage at losing her again.

* * *

When she'd stepped into the Tower, he'd been sure she was a dream. He was dying, he knew it, so it wasn't even all that surprising that his failing senses would fabricate Clara's ghost, young and beautiful and perfect, coming back to help him pull a Christmas cracker, a fitting bang of an end to his very long life.

She was still the first thing he thought of upon waking and before sleeping, despite her being dead for nearly 800 years. And he'd been glad that he'd get to spend his last moments with her, even if she did seem curiously real and solid for a ghost.

It's only now, after he's begun to regenerate, and pieces of hostile alien ships are falling from the sky, raining down on Trenzalore, that he realizes what's actually happened.

Not a dream. _Real._ With real Clara, from the past, the Clara whom he'd sent back the last time, who had been cooking a Christmas turkey in the Time Winds of the TARDIS. And Tasha Lem, who had watched him love and mourn Clara Oswald for century after lonely century, had fought against the Dalek inside her broken body and brought his wife back to him, so that he wouldn't be alone when the end came.

But because of Clara, the end was now the beginning.

 _This_ was what she had meant, he realizes with a shock so big it makes his legs weak beneath him. When she'd promised him she was coming back, it wasn't just that brief day they'd had together, eating marshmallows on top of the roof and lying to her in the control room while his hearts broke into pieces before he'd sent her back. It had been _this_. As the regeneration energy flows through him on top of the Tower, with Clara somewhere below, he knows now what she'd meant.

He was going to live on, with more adventures in the TARDIS. And she was going to be with him. This was the gray area of the future she'd known, the one that had puzzled him for so long. More lives, more running.

He staggers at the realization, and at the regeneration energy that's already coursing through him. He sees the TARDIS and knows Clara will be heading there soon, waiting for him.

 _Oh, Clara_ , he thinks desperately. _Why did you do this to me? Why did you save me when I was so ready to follow you into death, my grave beside yours, remember?_

He shuts his eyes, because the Clara inside the Tower knows nothing of what's to come, had only acted to save him. Because that's what she always did, she saved him.

He sighs heavily, and then jerks as a surge of regeneration energy pulses in his body. This Clara isn't the Clara he married, the one he buried. She doesn't know. She has no knowledge that she's his wife, that he loves her so much he's ached for her every day for centuries, and that his soul is forever linked to hers.

She'd just wanted to save him. And now, he knows, he must beg her to save him again, after he regenerates. He has no idea what kind of person he'll be, what kind of body he'll get, but he knows that whatever happens, the new him will still be bound to Clara Oswald, and will need her more than he'll possibly be able to explain.

The regeneration energy surges once more, this time so violently that he feels his body change. For a moment, he thinks the regen has already happened, but then looks down and sees the same knobbly hands, the spindly legs, but less lined with age.

 _Reset_ , he thinks, and realizes he's only got moments left before the real change happens. He begins to panic. How will he explain it to her? How will he get the words out when he knows that as soon as he sees her he'll long to touch her so much that it will overwhelm him. And touching her is something he mustn't do, because he could burn her up with the slightest brush of his skin. He'll have to keep his distance, distract himself any way he can.

So how can he say the goodbye, the pleading to stay, that he needs to say?

He looks around wildly, and then spots the phone on the TARDIS. He moves quickly, grabs the handset and staggers inside his beloved ship, pressing a hand against her door in the control room.

"Hey, sexy," he whispers affectionately. "In a bit of bother."

The TARDIS groans softly and he smiles. "You helped her save me before, remember? I need you to help her save me one last time."

His ship wheezes back and he sighs in relief. "You'll know the right time to call, won't you? Just let me talk to her when she needs to hear me. Just one last time."

He puts the phone to his ear, waits as it begins to ring, sending silent thanks to the TARDIS. But when he hears her voice, hears Clara's cheerful, "Hello?", all the breath leaves him and he slides to the ground, his head against the TARDIS for support. He can tell, just from the timbre of her voice, that she's only a few days older than the Clara here on Trenzalore. That means that the moment she's ready to leave him is almost immediately after he regenerates. What can he have changed into that would make her want to leave so soon? Panic fills him, and he blurts out:

"It's me." His voice is scratchy, and he bites his lip to keep from adding, _your husband_.

"Yes, it's you," Clara says casually. "Who is this?"

His eyes squeeze shut. _It's the man who loves you_ , he wants to yell. _Please don't leave me already, Clara._ Instead he tamps down the words, despite the last remnants of the truth field ebbing away.

But the sound of her voice nearly brings tears of relief to his eyes. Even now, he hears the hope in her voice, the bravery. He loves her so much it burns through him, a fire more dazzling than even the regeneration energy coursing through him. He'd been so afraid of having to face a new life, tethered to her when she didn't know who he was, what he was to her, how much he loved her. But he's suddenly not afraid anymore. And it doesn't matter how much it's going to hurt to see her, now. He's going to live, and Clara is going to be at his side, for years if he's lucky. He's cheated the odds and won, again.

He knows her so well, and he knows what to say to convince her to stay with him. Because this Clara, even if she doesn't know it, yet, loves him, too.

He simply needs to remind her to be brave once more. And Clara will never let him down.

* * *

He straightens his shoulders, and goes inside the TARDIS. He doesn't have to remove the clothes that are sagging on his body, but suddenly, he makes his way to his wardrobe and fishes out the things that will fit him better. Somehow, he wants to look well for Clara before this version of him disappears forever.

He hopes briefly that the new body isn't too much of a shock for her. It had sounded so much older than this body, the one she'd loved for over 60 years. And even though he knows Clara well enough to know that she'd hardly care about him looking older, she'd most definitely worry about him being in a body that was more fragile and prone to getting hurt. He wishes against reason that he could change the future and stay the same for her, to save their time together. But even the Time Lords can't give him that miracle. Times change, and so must he.

The only thing that won't change, he knows, is what he feels for her, despite the fact that he'll have to let go of her.

But not today, please, please, not today.

Whoever he becomes, he orders his brain, he must remember one thing:

 _No matter the cost, let me be the man who will always save Clara Oswald._

He finishes the bow tie just as he hears her come skidding into the TARDIS control room above him.

 _I love you, my Clara_ , he thinks. _I'll love you as long as you breathe, and even after. And when I dream at night, it will be of how you loved me under the stars of Trenzalore, and made me the happiest man in the universe_.

He squares his shoulders and climbs the stairs, and every step is like an echo through time, of days when he laughed with her, fought with her, pulled her from disaster, sank inside of her body and felt more loved than a wretch like him deserved to feel. He reaches the top of the stairs, and his breath nearly leaves him when she spins around.

Joy explodes inside him once more, just seeing her, her eyes and her fear and her kindness. And for the first time, the thought that flits through his brain isn't " _Mine_." It's something else that he should have known all along. When he sees the woman he has loved for a thousand years, and would love for billions, if he'd had them, who has saved him over and over again, the thought he has is this:

 _I am yours._

For he knows that the moment he saw her face, his life could begin again. He's ready to begin. Because Clara Oswald and the Doctor in the TARDIS…

That's how it was always meant to be.

* * *

The End


End file.
